Shafer Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon 2001 (750ml)

The 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select is a potentially perfect wine in the making. A skyscraper that builds in the mouth with multiple dimensions, amazing layers of flavor, great delicacy, and tremendous purity, this inky purple-colored Cabernet offers extraordinarily pure creme de cassis notes intermixed with crushed rocks, flowers, sweet oak, an amazingly powerful yet impeccably balanced mid-palate, and a sweet, 70-second finish. This prodigious Cabernet Sauvignon is about as good as Cabernet can be. Critical Acclaim RP100 Robert Parker's Wine Advocate I should not be surprised that the 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon Hillside Select merited a perfect rating since I rated it 99 eight years ago. I also gave the 2002 Hillside Select a perfect rating. Kudos to Doug and John Shafer for creating two perfect wines in back to back vintages. The 2001 is a big wine (14.9% natural alcohol), but the alcohol is buried beneath an avalanche of creme de cassis, wood smoke, toast, licorice and spring